With the 2014 bowl season about to begin, it's time to hand out some regular season awards to the most memorable games of a thrilling season.
Game of the Year, Hindsight Edition: TCU at Baylor
Didn't see that one coming, did we? Had you skimmed the slate of games on the second weekend in October, you would be excused if you hadn't highlighted the Bears and Horned Frogs as a game of major influence. LSU was visiting Florida, Oregon was headed to face UCLA in the Rose Bowl, and even in the Big 12 and the Lone Star State, Oklahoma and Texas were set for Charlie Strong's first Red River Shootout.
But more important than any of those matchups, the Big 12's playoff fate was largely determined that day Saturday in Waco. Baylor rallied furiously to edge TCU 60-57 in what certainly looks like 2014's game of the year, even if defense was a mere formality by the fourth quarter.
Sure, both teams were ranked in the top ten by that point, so the slugfest hardly went by unnoticed. But by running out of gas just short of the finish line that day, we now know TCU was doomed to trail Baylor in the season's final standings.
Game Most Likely to Be a Cross-Dimensional Message From Matthew McConaughey and Not a Believable Sports Result: Indiana at Missouri
Indiana, the poor Big Ten's once and future doormat, faced its reciprocal trip to Columbia after losing to Missouri 45-28 in 2013. Missouri, the once and future SEC East Champs, was 3-0 after pasting defending Fiesta Bowl champs UCF, 38-10.
So, of course, the Hoosiers pulled the upset on September 20, 31-27. The intrigue only grows deeper upon further inspection.
Two weeks earlier, Missouri strangely traveled to play at Toledo. Forget coach Gary Pinkel's ties to his former employer or quarterback Maty Mauk's Northwest Ohio roots; SEC teams just don't play road games in MAC country.
Of course, the same can usually be said for Big Ten teams. Indiana also broke the mould of its conference brethren fattening up home schedules by traveling near the banks of Lake Erie to play Bowling Green.
But perhaps the most damning evidence that this game was altered by beings beyond our three or four dimensional existence is how each team's season played out following the shocking result. The Tigers went on to win their second consecutive SEC East crown, sweeping a conference road slate that included the Swamp and Allen Field. Meanwhile, the Hoosiers needed a final weekend home win over hapless Purdue to avoid a winless conference record.
Someday, the ESPNU footage of this game will be scrutinized by scientists looking for evidence of life beyond our planet. Because that's the only way I'll ever believe the 2014 Hoosiers walked out of Missouri with a win.
Game Vegas Did Not See Coming: Ohio State vs. Wisconsin, Big Ten Championship
Let's just say those huge casinos in the desert aren't built by setting lines 63 points different than final scores.
Game Most Likely to Discourage Your Son From Playing Football: Virginia Tech/Wake Forest
There's an expression that all serious gamblers won the first time they bet, otherwise they would have quit immediately. I don't know if we should assume all serious football players watched good games the first time they saw the sport, but nobody whose maiden football experience involved two putrid ACC teams going to overtime scoreless could have thought, "Wow, what a great sport!"
The Hokies and Demon Deacons combined for 26 scoreless drives in 60 minutes. But at least Wake tried to score, missing three field goals during regulation.
Virginia Tech — the same Virginia Teach that beat playoff-bound Ohio State in Columbus — punted nine times, turned the ball over three, and mercifully let one drive fade away into halftime.
The mid-Atlantic is a proud and talent-rich football region. Let's just hope the next Michael Vick didn't pick up a basketball for keeps after this monstrosity.
Game Best Proving That Preseason Rankings Are a Snow Globe Inside a Pizza Oven: Texas A&M at South Carolina
Opening Thursday's featured event was supposed to announce the arrival of two possible SEC Championship contenders, the SEC Network, and Brent Musburger's post-primetime gig. As it turns out, we didn't need to hear from any of them again for the rest of the year.
The Gamecocks, who opened the season ranked sixth, were drubbed 52-28 by the Aggies as newly installed quarterback Kenny Hill threw for a school-record 511 yards, something Johnny Manziel never did. Of course, South Carolina would also later lose to Kentucky and, in the most unSpurrierian of results, Clemson.
A&M, meanwhile, rode the big opening win to a top-ten position in the polls, only to 0-for-October, including a 59-0 spanking at Alabama. In November, Hill would be suspended for two games, though the Aggies won each.
Preseason rankings: they're based on almost nothing!
Game We Might Finally Get After All: Alabama vs. Oregon, College Football Playoff Championship
We've been so close quite a few times. In 2009, the Ducks had momentum following a Halloween-night thrashing of USC, only to trip at Stanford the following week and settle for the Rose Bowl while Alabama defeated Texas in that same stadium a week later.
In 2010, Oregon held up its end of the journey to the BCS title game, but the Tide fell three times in SEC play and settled for the Capital One Bowl.
But most memorably, while Alabama reached the 2011 and 2012 season's title games, Oregon twice lost its penultimate conference game by a field goal, the first time to USC and the second, in overtime, to Stanford. In each case, a Duck victory could have led to a date with the Tide.
Now, Alabama and Oregon, each touchdown-plus favorites, can deliver the long lusted-for new-school vs. old-school matchup by holding serve one more time. Sure, neither squad represents its programs recent best, and the coaching staffs (namely the absence of Chip Kelly and the presence of Lane Kiffin) make these versions feel more like Barry Switzer's Cowboys than Jimmy Johnson's, but this would have to be a better game than the Tide out-'Bama-ing LSU or Notre Dame.
I have defended the BCS for doing exactly what it was supposed to do before, but this inaugural year of the playoff is so much more exciting. Consider how the BCS system would have handled 2014.
Florida State would absolutely have finished atop the BCS. While the Seminoles are seriously maligned by the computers (15th in Jeff Sagarin's poll!), they would have dominated both human polls and led a fairly even group of one-loss teams.
More importantly, instead of looking forward to seeing Alabama and Oregon potentially play, we would have spent the past month trying to separate them. Was the Michigan-variety a better home MSU win than the Mississippi version? Does Oregon get credit for exacting revenge for its sole defeat? Was the poll-topping mid-season euphoria surrounding SEC West dominance mostly hype?
(For the record, the answers are: No, Yes, and Oh Yeah, Definitely)
There's much excitement around the first College Football Playoff, and rightfully so. Not only do two more teams have a change to win the national title, but New Year's Day is re-established as a great stage for the sport. But perhaps most importantly, the playoff moves the debate down from teams No. 2 and 3 to No. 4 and 5. It seems like a small difference, but with just a small change in the cutoff, the playoff can exclude a slightly lesser team with a slightly less compelling argument.
The 2014 college football season has been wild and strange, and yet, the four playoff teams were all ranked in the preseason AP top five.
When a story is this fun, you can forgive a predictable ending.
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